In the spring of 1993, my sister, Ananya disappeared.
At first everyone thought that it was a kidnapping but when no ransom calls with demands for money came, the police investigate took a different turn. The family members became suspects, rumours of foul play and child abuse were whispered in private corners and when enough time passed and there was still no sign of her, people began saying that to our face. They called my family murderers, child killers and other more vulgar names I do not wish to repeat. The townspeople shunned everyone in my family, everyone except me.
They looked at me with pity and concern, imagining in their heads the horrors I must be facing at the hands of my parents.
Are you alright? Are you happy there? They feed you, don't they?- these were the questions I got asked ever so often by the good samaritans of kananpur, I always reassured them that everything was fine but inside I secretly loathed each and every one of them for what they were doing to my family.
Was I alright? No. I was not. My family's suffering had become a matter of gossip and public ridicule. Instead of receiving support or even sympathy they had become subjects of hatred and suspicion. No one allowed their children to play with me or anywhere near our land for that matter.
None of them knew the truth nor did they wish to discover it. Not even my parents knew what had happened to Ana. The only person who did was me.
This is my confession. I want to unburden myself of this- this secret, this guilt, I've been carrying around since I was a child.
________________________
Kananpur is a small town located at the edge of the Sira forest, our house like many others sat at its boundaries so, it was like having a forest in our backyard. When we first moved into our new house, Ana and I were ecstatic. As city kids we found all the open spaces and greenery pretty cool. Some mornings we'd see deer grazing in our backyard! It was our very own fairy tale home.
A few weeks after we moved in, we went exploring the forest. Laughing and giggling as we pretended to be space rangers exploring a new planet when Ana saw it.
The well.
It looked like something out of a fairy tale.
"look Ayush! A wishing well!" She screamed with glee, looking at it with wide eyes.
We both ran to it and just before I could reach the well, I fell down, tripping over a dead branch. I got up with all the flamboyance of a wounded rouge and said to her, "looks like I need medical assistance comrade, I'll head back to home base and return ASAP. Stay put and keep a sharp look out for those damn natives." Saluting with two fingers I turned around and went home as she stood beside that well, giggling at my antics with a hand covering her mouth.
"Yes sir! you take care now. And don't you die on me!" She said, in an exaggerated accent.
I raced back home, the cut on my leg bleeding more than I'd expected.
It turned out that I needed four stitches for it. That night when we went to bed Ana told me about a new friend she'd made. She wouldn't shut up about it and all the fun they had playing by the old well.
That was the day things changed without any of us knowing or noticing. The days that followed are all a blur in my mind now, they were pretty much the same.
Everything was the same, except Ana.
She became distant, moody, irritable. She was the happiest when she was out playing in the forest and one day she went out and didn't come back.
My parents were so worried, I can still remember their faces. At first they were angry at her, then they became worried and as the clock crept closer to midnight fear started taking its hold.
I remember being unable to sleep, I was worried about her too and suddenly out of the blue I remembered Ananya's new friend. The one she'd met at the well. Thinking Ana might have gone there I sneaked out of the house with only my flashlight in hand, wanting to rescue her before our parents found her.
She'd get a proper spanking if they did.
I ran into the forest, following the now familiar trail towards the well and I stop a few feet away, breathing out in relief when I see Ana sitting at its edge. She was precariously close to the well's mouth but she didn't seem to notice. She just sat there swinging her legs and smiling at me.
"Ananya you idiot, ma and dada are so mad at you right now. What are you doing here!" I remember berating her.
"Ana? Get off from there. It's not safe." The first little tingles of fear brushed against my neck as I looked at her. And when I walked a few steps closer to her, I stopped short.
Ananya wasn't alone. She sat on the lap of a black thing that looked human but wasn't. It looked like a woman with shiny black skin, like it was covered in polish or oil and her eyes- God how I wish I could forget those eyes- were huge and white with small black pinpricks at the centre. Some sort of insects buzzed around her and she reeked of rotting garbage and around her tendrils of black smoke slithered like snakes.
This woman. This thing held my sister in its lap and looked at me with those eyes and I couldn't move and then she raised one claw like finger to her lips.
"Sshhhh." she said, with something resembling a grin on her face. I stood frozen, unable to move or scream.
"Bye bye Ayush. " Ana said, smiling and those were her last words before-before she was pulled down the well. And then she was gone.
She was gone and so was the thing that held her.
I ran from there. I ran as fast as my legs could carry me and I didn't look back once.
A few months after she disappeared we relocated. I never told anyone about the well or what I'd seen there and I never went back there to look for Ana.
All my life I've been plagued with questions- could I have saved her? Was there some way I could have gotten her back from the well? What was that thing that took her? Is she alive or is she dead?
These are the questions I'll never know the answers to because I did nothing to find them.
I don't know if I could have saved Ananya because I never tried.
I turned around and looked away, I ran away from her instead of going towards her. I didn't help my own sister. I abandoned her to an unknown fate and that is the guilt I've been living with.
This is my confession.
We all like to think of ourselves as brave and selfless but I don't think we know who we are untill we are required to be those things.
We don't know until that moment arrives.
_____________________
